1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to quilted craft articles, and, more particularly, to equipment and methodology for making patchwork quilts that are accessible and practicable for home hobbyists.
2. Background Art
Quilting is deeply engrained as a traditional craft and folk art form in many cultures throughout the world. In America, quilting became a popular craft during the westward migrations of the 19th Century, when quilting circles and quilting bees provided an enjoyable social pastime for women. Handmade quilts, often created as gifts for weddings or births, became family heirlooms, handed down from one generation to another. Such quilts would frequently form a mosaic of the quilter's life by incorporating swatches of material having sentimental value, such as patches from a bridal gown or a baby garment.
Beyond the functionality of the quilt, there is an aesthetic dimension, which offers almost limitless potential for self-expression. Therefore, the decorative patterns and designs according to which elements of the quilt are assembled are of central importance. Because of the strongly traditional character of quilting, new designs often evolve from pre-existing patterns, in the usual manner of folk art. It follows that quilting techniques emphasize both reproducibility and variability as a highly desirable features.
A quilt comprises two or more layers of material joined together by stitching. A typical quilt has three layers: (1) a quilt top, which incorporates a decorative pattern, (2) a middle layer of batting or wadding, which consists of an insulating material, such as cotton or wool, (3) a backing layer, to which the quilt top and the batting are sewn. The quilt top may be patchwork, i.e., comprising multiple pieces of fabric sewn together to make a decorative pattern, or whole-cloth, in which a single piece of fabric has a decorative pattern applied by stitching, appliqué and/or embroidery.
For patchwork quilts, the quilting process comprises six steps: (1) selecting a pattern and materials, (2) cutting pieces of fabric to make the “blocks” that will form the pattern of the quilt top, (3) “piecing” the blocks together to make a finished quilt top, (4) layering the quilt top over the batting and backing, (5) stitching by hand or machine through all three layers, (6) trimming excess batting from the edges and sewing binding to the quilt perimeter.
The present invention concerns itself with the “piecing” step of the quilting process. Piecing involves sewing blocks together to create the overall decorative pattern of the quilt top. The blocks may be whole-cloth, or they make comprise smaller pieces of fabric sewn together. They may be sewn together edgewise or interconnected by strips of cloth called sashing. Blocks typically have geometric shapes, such as squares or rectangles, so that they can laid out in a geometric format, such as a rectilinear grid, to form the overall decorative pattern.
The overall decorative pattern of the quilt top may be formed by the combined effect of the interior patterns of the blocks “flowing” from one block to another. Alternately, the overall pattern may comprise a repetitive sequence of the interior patterns of the blocks. In either case, the position of each block in the overall pattern is of paramount importance, and reliably keeping track of that position during the piecing process is absolutely essential.
In the commercial manufacture of quilts, the blocks can be laid out in the desired overall pattern and kept in the that pattern while a “long-arm” sewing machine moves on tracks over the fabric and sews the layers together. For quilting hobbyists and crafters working at home, however, the initial layout of the blocks must be disassembled in order for pairs of blocks to be hand sewn or passed through a home sewing machine. Therefore, the craft quilter needs a method that tracks the position of each block in the overall pattern after the initial layout has been disassembled.
For a large quilt comprising 500 or more blocks, keeping track of the position of each block in the overall pattern presents a difficult problem. The prior art has attempted to address this problem by employing templates. Shane, U.S. Pat. No. 4,814,218, teaches the use of a numbered pattern template with a correspondingly numbered paper pattern. The numbered paper pattern is used to cut pieces having a color and/or pattern that matches the numbered position on the template. The position of each piece in the overall design is established not by any indicia on the pieces themselves, but by the numbered slits on the template into which the pieces are inserted.
Similarly, the published patent application of Boring, Pub. No. US 2008/0029006, discloses a method for making an appliqué that uses a numbered pattern template along with a correspondingly numbered paper pattern. Using the paper pattern, pieces are cut out and numbered in accordance with the positions on the pattern template to which they are to be applied.
Neither Shane nor Boring, however, teaches a sewing method of piecing a patchwork quilt top. In Shane, the pieces inserted into the template cannot be sewn together, but instead must be held together by the template. Similarly, in Boring the pieces comprise appliqué that adhesively attaches to the template. At the end of both of these processes, the template remains an integral part of the quilt/appliqué. Hence, the Shane and Boring methodologies cannot be applied to traditional quilting techniques, in which the blocks must be sewn together independent of any template backing.
Both Shane and Boring also have the disadvantage of limiting the quilter's creativity by forcing her/him to follow a prescribed template in order to practice these inventions. If the quilter wishes to deviate from the template pattern or create a new pattern, she/he is compelled to undertake the onerous and time-consuming task of making an entirely new template. Consequently, while the template methodologies may be useful for beginning quilters, they are inappropriate for experienced quilters who have the desire and skill to expand upon pre-existing decorative patterns.
The present invention dispenses with the need for a tangible pattern template by employing a series of pattern indicia that are detachably affixed to each of the blocks in accordance with a formatting sequence that encodes the overall decorative pattern of the quilt top. The formatting sequence of the pattern indicia is such that it can be mentally visualized without the need for a physical template. As applied to a typical rectilinear grid pattern of a patchwork quilt, for example, the pattern indicia could comprise column and row numbers, such that the pattern indicia “D15” might represent “the 15th row in the 4th column”. Thus, after the pattern indicia are affixed to each block, the rectilinear layout of the blocks can be reproduced without reference to a physical template.
Another advantage of the present invention over the prior art is that the pattern indicia are reusable and are adaptable to virtually any type of overall decorative pattern. The pattern indicia can take the convenient form of a flat-head pin, with the indicia inscribed on the head. While the use of indicia-bearing pins is known in the quilting craft in the form of “directional arrow” pins, such pins do not keep track of the positions of individual quilt pieces, but rather indicate the direction in which the piece is to be oriented so that its internal pattern fits into the overall decorative pattern of the quilt top.